Sharon's Experiment
by the stargate time traveller
Summary: Set in the episode "The Experiment," Sharon's thoughts and point of view of what's going on as Glind tries to find out more about her abilities, and the plot to kill her and Richard and Craig.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer - I don't own the Champions, but I do own this particular piece of work.

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Sharon's Experiment.

The tests were over, much to Sharon's relief. She wasn't a stranger to tests, but Dr Daniel's manner worried her. The older woman had been impatient, harsh and rough in some cases, and she'd also been condescending; the syringe sprang to mind, but the condescending manner had gotten to Sharon but now it was all over, and she was more than thankful.

Hopefully, now she could get some answers; it was obvious Glind was behind those people who'd been watching her (she didn't think Tremayne had suspected she'd known, but telepathy and ESP came in handy), and she wanted to know why.

"…of course, I'll confirm later when I've had the blood and X-ray reports," Daniel's was saying as she left with the X-ray plate, it amazed the young woman that Daniels was rude one minute, and the next it was like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth.

"Excellent," Glind came over to where Sharon was sitting and removed the belt around her head. "Well, you've been very patient my dear."

"I had no choice," Sharon replied, thankful it was over and not even concealing it from the doctor. "I think you owe me some kind of an explanation, Dr Glind."

While the test wasn't that much of a bother to Sharon, she just wanted one thing. Answers. She had so many questions and Glind had those answers she needed.

"Of course," the older man replied graciously, Sharon didn't know for sure if the gracious manner was his usual facade or something just for her and other newcomers. "My office is through here," he gestured and started to head in the direction of the nearby door he'd just indicated.

Standing up, Sharon said, "And then I'd like to speak to Nemesis." She needed to speak to Tremayne, find out if he knew about this place, but something told her that it wouldn't be easy. Cranmore had lied to her about Nemesis knowing she was here. She knew that.

Glind's hand had just grasped the doorknob when she'd made her request, now he turned to face her. "Well, I'm sorry I thought the position had been explained to you," he replied apologetically, but something in his manner struck her as insincere, "this is a secret establishment."

"But so is Nemesis."

"They are aware you have accepted our offer. No other communication is necessary," Glind said.

"In other words, you won't allow it." Sharon wondered if Glind truly believed she was being taken in by all this.

"While you are here, no. The project is too important," Glind replied, and seemingly satisfied that he'd finally made his case clear, he opened the door and she followed him inside. The moment she walked into the office she became aware of the electronic instruments in the room itself. This conversation was going to be monitored, and from the feel of it, the instruments would also be sensitive to tell if she was lying or not.

"Sit down, my dear," the doctor said, gesturing to a chair, and seeing no other choice if she wanted the answers to the questions that had been bugging her ever since she'd arrived at this place, she went over while she heard the door close behind her, and sat on the chair. It took Sharon only a moment to relax, but with the room under surveillance, she didn't completely let her guard down.

Dr Glind had begun speaking as she had walked over to the chair. "You've met our team, seen them in action, you must have some idea of what we're attempting to do?" he asked sounding very much like a school teacher asking a question with a very obvious answer. But he was right, she did have a good idea what they were doing with Susan, Marion, Paul and Jean, the four agents she had seen when she'd arrived, but she wanted Glind to tell her for himself, besides she had the feeling he wanted to tell her.

"I'd prefer you to tell me," Sharon said trying to hide the humour in her voice, she found it amusing to feed the question back to him.

"The purpose of this experiment is to find ways of speeding up the human reflex," Glind began, his tone making it obvious that he enjoyed and loved this subject.

"Artificially?" Sharon asked, thinking of all the drugs and performance-enhancing chemicals out there.

"Well, we've tried most of the stimulants," Glind gently threw his hands up and moved around the room, as if he imagined it would help him find the answer himself without needing to go through all this trouble, "of course, but without success. However," he turned around, and his face seemed to burn with the passion Sharon had spotted only a moment ago as he'd begun to explain his project, "we've found that certain agents operating in the field had a highly developed," he twiddled his hands as he worked out the best words to describe the phenomenon, "sixth sense. A sort of nose for danger, if you like."

Sharon began to understand where all this was leading to. The people in Tibet had probably reached and passed the level Glind and his colleagues had tried to reach centuries ago. She wondered how that old man and those white-clad people Craig and Richard had described during those moments where they had been half awake after that crash in Tibet on the way back from China would have taken their progress.

Now in full lecture mode, Glind held up his finger as he started walking back close to where Sharon was sitting comfortably, "We chose four of those people, and subjected them to 3 months of intensive training."

Sharon listened as the doctor went on with polite interest, inwardly her mind raced as she tried to work out just how many other agents there were out there who had talents similar to what they had, and indeed what she herself possessed along with Craig and Richard.

"We have found a way of, uh, developing that sixth sense," Glind went on, moving to stand by his desk once more, and looking into space, clearly proud of his accomplishment.

"Why all the secrecy, doctor?" Sharon broke her silence, curious why he hadn't made it clear and viable for other agencies who would jump at the chance to have agents who were stronger and faster than what they had already. Armed forces would be even more interested.

"Because the four people you met today are the most advanced human beings on Earth," the doctor replied, gazing down at her, even more, proud about what he had done.

"Because they're fast?" Sharon clarified.

"Miss Macready, when people move and react at incredible speeds, it is no longer possible for the normal senses to cope. The mind must make use of shortcuts, forms of telepathy, clairvoyance, extrasensory perception," Glind explained before he looked more pointedly down at her from where he was now sitting on the edge of his desk, "You should realise that."

"Should I?" Sharon asked innocently, knowing full well what he was saying. She was also trying very hard to contain her nerves, which wasn't difficult for her, but with the way she was being watched while this interrogation went on, she needed to have all of her wits.

"The four people outside are not the only ones with powers, it seems. We are not fools, my dear," the doctor shook his head, but for some reason, he spoke smugly, though it wasn't doing him any favours. "We have sufficient information on your work with Nemesis to realise you certain of these talents yourself. The question is," he folded his arms as he looked with unhidden scientific curiosity down at Sharon, who was surprised he had more or less admitted that his people had been following her even if he hadn't outright said as much, "how did you get them?"

Sharon was about to respond when she felt the electronic instruments in the room becoming even more alert - during the whole conversation she had been aware of their presence, but now they were like invisible searchlights probing every pore of her body.

"That's not a question I can answer, doctor," Sharon replied, relying on her own mental abilities to fool the machines spying on her.

"Then who can?" Glind pressed.

Sharon didn't respond. She could tell thanks to the electronic instruments in the room there was a lot of impatience on the other end, clearly hoping for her to spill the beans.

"Miss Macready our work here is vital," Glind said, losing some of his patience though he kept his voice level all the time. "You must know the Eastern powers have been working on Extra sensory perception for years. Now, for all I know, your talents could be superior to those we have developed here. You must help us."

Sharon knew he was telling the truth. Ever since that business in Tibet during the Chinese case years ago, she, Craig, and Richard had discussed everything that had happened. Richard hadn't been able to get any more about the types of talents and skills they now possessed, though he had told them the old man had said they would need to learn how to use them, much like newborn children would learn how to walk and talk. It had taken time for them to gain some idea of what their powers could do, but they were still a long way from learning their limits.

Ever since Tibet, the three of them had made a pact to not tell anyone the truth. As Tremayne had so kindly pointed out, they had had no equipment and very little food. At the time the three of them had considered telling him the truth later on when they had developed a good idea of what they now were.

Unfortunately, that plan was now down the drain. Ever since that mess with the Interrogator and Craig was practically tortured by a member of their own organisation, the trio had agreed to take steps to make sure they didn't appear too cocky, and it had made the three of them realise that although they could trust Tremayne, he couldn't be trusted with that kind of information.

"But I've already agreed to," Sharon said, putting on an act that should hopefully tell the doctor that the abilities he was talking about couldn't be described by words, but were something that just happened.

Real impatience showed for the first time in Glind's manner as the doctor stood up, "Then please begin by telling me how they were developed," he said.

Sharon changed her facade slightly, still putting on the innocent act but decreasing it a little to a more apologetic one. "I'm sorry, I can't," she replied.

"You mean I must ask Nemesis?" Glind's expression was torn between curiosity, impatience, and outright indignation.

"Nemesis can't tell you anything either," Sharon replied speaking the truth, knowing the man was bluffing; he'd already said this place was a secret establishment, and she was sure the doctor was lying about contacting Nemesis to inform them of her agreement to partake in the experiment here in the first place.

Glind had probably not even informed the agencies the other agents worked for, but she wasn't going to go to all the trouble of asking them about how they'd ended up here.

Glind's face moved as if he wanted to say something but thought better of it, and he walked away from the desk again - the man seemed incapable of standing still - and when he resumed speaking his voice had returned to its original gracious manner. "As you wish," he said as if he would learn the answers in time, though it was clear from the brief moment where he had been impatient to Sharon that he was being insincere once more, "your caution will not affect the experiment."

"Which is?" Sharon was intrigued now, and she didn't hide her interest.

"A test, my dear," Glind said, jabbing his finger in her direction for emphasis, "your talents against their's."

"And if I refuse?" Sharon asked though they both knew she had no intention of doing so.

Glind seemed to realise that already, and he bent lower to address her better. "You won't because you want to find out the answer as much as I do."

Glind had her there, and they both knew it, but for Sharon, it was simply a matter of curiosity. After Tibet, she and the others had conducted a series of experiments by themselves, but there was only so much they could do. But their nascent work was more than enough to teach them how to use their powers, like how strong they were, and the limits of their speed and their reflexes, and how long they could hold their breaths for without inhaling, but those experiments had been basic and was more what you'd expect from people who were trying to relearn how to walk and perform everyday tasks after suffering a nasty accident.

Maybe, Sharon thought to herself even as she concentrated on making sure the electronic instruments in the room didn't read too much into her responses, she could learn something here after all, and depending on what happened, maybe she could share those experiences with Craig and Richard.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer - I don't own the Champions. I just own this story.

Feedback, feel free.

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Sharon's Experiment.

Sharon had the time alone to think as she put on her gym outfit as she got ready for the next test. The outfit she'd been issued wasn't much - just a simple white top, white shorts, and white socks and white sports shoes, just a basic workout outfit. She didn't really know what the test was going to be and what was involved in them; she'd seen an example already, but seeing and experiencing something like that only took her knowledge only so far, then again she didn't really understand what the point behind her being here was. It hadn't been a very good couple of days - being sent here on leave by Tremayne was unexpected, landing in Britain and then kidnapped by a phoney who'd spun her an obvious lie, and then being singled out by one of the agents here in a fencing duel. She also didn't believe Glind and Cranmore's tale about her being cleared to be here by Nemesis. If they thought she'd buy that, Sharon thought, they were going to be in for a rude awakening.

Did they truly think she was going to believe them? She wasn't the same terrified woman who'd been in a shot down the plane over Tibet. Sharon almost smiled at the memory of the person she'd been before she'd volunteered to go on that mission to acquire those maggots breeding bacteria as part of a secret Chinese experiment into biowarfare. She'd been in the field for too long to fall for something that stupid, besides her testing of Cranmore in that taxi cab had given her the answer she needed at the time.

Sharon wasn't naive.

She was being kidnapped, then again she wouldn't have expected anything less considering for some time she'd noticed someone following her. Tremayne knew, too, and she felt more like a worm on a fishing line, being dipped into the water for the first bite. Secret missions behind other colleagues backs weren't unusual in their business, but Sharon didn't feel like this was one of those they don't need to know types. Sharon had been surprised when he'd summoned her to his office, struck up a brisk conversation that went nowhere, then demanded she go on leave. Just like that. No warning or even a hint, it was just dropped on her head like a brick. Sharon had been suspicious of that order then because it wasn't like Tremayne to suddenly suggest a leave of all things, but her mind had gone back to when she'd noticed someone following her, and those looks Tremayne had been sending her; they were concerned worried looks.

While she was pleased he was concerned, Sharon had tried to investigate the people following her, to no avail. That was one reason she'd gone in the first place, so then she'd be in the line of fire to learn what was going on. She'd gone to London; after spending so long in Geneva and only returning to her home country sporadically and only on cases, Sharon was determined to spend as much time at home as she could before returning to work even if she knew leaving Nemesis might give her stalkers the chance they needed. But she knew it wouldn't be that simple.

Then she'd met Cranmore, who'd told her he worked for British intelligence. He was a phoney, and she'd seen straight through him, but she'd been intrigued by the case he'd presented her. He'd brought her to this lodge and had met 'the most advanced human beings on this Earth.' It had made her concerned since Sharon, Craig and Richard had abilities far superior to that of a regular human being, but truthfully it was good to meet other people who had skills and talents close to those that the people in Tibet had gifted them with. It meant they weren't alone.

True, they weren't as skilled as Sharon and the others were, but she guessed their abilities weren't to be scoffed at, otherwise they wouldn't all be here. Besides, she had been curious about them, though Sharon had been creeped out by how much they thought they knew about her when they'd met in the gymnasium, how they knew so much about her ID number for Nemesis, her hobbies and interests, her scientific skills in Medicine and biology. That part had always annoyed her about the intelligence services; they were so good at noting down the particulars of someone down, but they didn't know anything else about her.

Sharon knew she was being hypocritical, she knew them already long before Cranmore had introduced them. She knew all about Susan Francis, Jean Jereau, Paul Lang, and Marion Grant, and who they worked for. Sharon knew them to be the best of the best, but she couldn't work out why they were so special until Glind had told her during that private meeting after the checkup. It was such a surprise to meet agents from different countries and agencies, but Sharon got the impression they weren't going to become friends anytime soon.

Oh, apart from Marion the others seemed pleasant enough, but Sharon didn't really know if she'd have a chance to properly know them. One of the first things she, Richard, and Craig had done after returning from that dreamlike assignment in Tibet was to experiment with their new abilities to see how far they could go; Sharon truly regretted not going with Richard to find that old man from that race of people who'd saved their lives when they'd had every reason to wish them to die, she'd had so many questions then she couldn't simply answer. The old man had told Richard his people had improved their bodies and minds, and Sharon had been amazed and disorientated by how well her mind was now organised, and how she could recall virtually every single detail even long after she'd pushed it to one side.

Well, the old man had told Richard they'd been given every talent and skill imaginable, but she, Richard and Craig had only touched the basics of their powers. She had no doubt they'd unlock the rest of them. After a very unpleasant medical check-up performed by Dr Daniels - Sharon didn't know the first thing about her, except she didn't seem to have the friendly manner required by someone who practiced medicine, though whether she did was an open question, Sharon felt uneasy about being anywhere near her - and then a talk with Dr. Glind. He might've been a perfect gentleman at the time, but Sharon hadn't bothered asking too many questions besides the norm; it was clear he wasn't going to bother, what would be the point?

But Glind's little explanation had intrigued her. Yes, she knew the Eastern powers were studying ESP, but she knew they were probably basing their research on agents much like the ones Glind had brought here, so there wasn't really anything special there. Looking back Sharon could see why Glind and Daniels insisted on carrying out those medical checkups - the Nemesis files wouldn't be accessible to them even if they wanted them, especially since they were lying about contacting them in the first place, and there was the possibility there would be discrepancies.

These people were conducting an experiment into superhumans, though Sharon didn't know what they wanted for an end result, she knew one thing; it was all a charade. They'd essentially kidnapped her for something. Glind was one of a hundred who were trying to push the boundaries of what the human body and mind could take, and he was right about how the senses couldn't cope. Stories like that were nothing new to her, she'd studied dozens of them. But she could not imagine why Glind would think he was reaching a breakthrough, which was the impression she'd gotten from him when she'd spoken to him about what the experiment entailed when he was using such outdated methods. Sharon frowned as she remembered her own foreboding as the conversation took a turn into territory best left avoided.

Ever since that mess with the interrogation a few years ago where Craig was subjected to a torturous round of interrogation by Nemesis operatives who wanted to know how he was able to do things the way he was now, they'd all collectively agreed to keep their heads down and not get cocky in their reports, unless they wanted an interrogation themselves. Sharon still hated herself for not doing anything to help Craig during that mess, it had taken longer for him to forgive them.

Sharon had lied when she'd said she didn't know where she'd gotten her powers, all that time knowing she was being watched and listened to by others all that time Glind was pumping her for information. She'd sensed the presence of a lie detector, and she'd managed to trick it into thinking she was telling the truth. She'd listened quietly to Glind's pleas that his work was vital, that she knew the Eastern powers were trying to develop ESP for their agents, and how she must help him.

But the one point she and Glind both agreed upon was that Sharon desperately wanted to know the root of her powers; Richard hadn't learnt any real answer from that old man, and she'd always been fascinated by how far she could push her powers, and that was the only reason Sharon was really going along with any of this.

But was there another reason she had been followed? Was that how they found the right agents?

She'd worked out already it was Glind's people following and watching her before Cranmore met her, and why was it every one working for Glind were vague despite the well thought out explanations? But the most important part was what 'the experiment' itself was all about. Why those agents in particular? Did they have some special quality no-one else had or was there more to it than that? But most importantly, why was she here? What was the end result of the experiment supposed to be? So far, she hadn't seen anything truly remarkable about it so far; just exercises that branched into the physical and mental powers of a human being. She hadn't heard Glind try to give out some kind of hint of what he wanted, not even a vague clue. The most worrying part was she was not allowed to contact anyone.

A secret establishment Sharon could understand, security would be present to ensure no spies got in or out, but she hadn't wanted to speak to Tremayne about the weather; she had wanted to know if her suspicions that he had known something were true. But truthfully she had seen the security of this place; a few armed guards with Cranmore presumably - probably - in charge was it. No phones lying around. Glind was taking it too seriously. It didn't matter. She knew she'd get out sooner or later. Sharon shrugged lightly before standing up. She imagined she'd find out the reasons soon enough, but first, she wanted to have a taste of what these tests were all about, and who knows, perhaps one of the other agents would answer some questions for her to put the pieces together. She'd just finished tying her laces and sorting out her shoes when she felt it, the telepathic link between herself, Craig and Richard. They were here.

She smiled in relief when she felt the sensation brush around her mind.

She wasn't being contacted, if she were then she'd have heard one of their voices, and the connection between them would be stronger. They probably didn't know she was there, they were nearby outside the house, studying it with their minds to get a feel of the place. She'd just felt a light brush with her senses, Richard's mind by the feel of it, but it was there. Sharon smiled, and walked over to the window desperately; it felt good to talk to one of the other two members of their trio after all of this. She opened the window and spoke telepathically. _**"Richard?"**_

"_**Sharon? Are you alright?"**_ Sharon heard the surprise in Richard's voice. Clearly, he hadn't expected her to be here, but that made two of them really; before leaving, she'd asked about Craig and Richard, why she was being sent on leave and they weren't. Tremayne had been reluctant to tell her, but he'd said something about getting a new case. Were they investigating Glind for something? As a specialist in medicine, Sharon had heard of Glind and knew of his reputation, and his fascination with extra sensory perception.

Looking back that reluctance was telling. "_**Fine,**_" she replied over their connection.

"_**How long have you been on this case**_?" Richard asked, sweeping his telepathic senses to try to find her, and she made it easy for him. Soon he found her staring out of the window. She could just about see him herself. She shrugged telepathically, _**"I wasn't aware I was on a case. Tremayne sent me on leave, and I mean sent. I was ordered to go." **_

"_**Then he knew something?" **_

Sharon nodded, knowing Richard would feel it. _**"I'm beginning to think so." **_The telepathic link between her and Richard faltered for a moment before she felt Craig's mind touch hers, likewise, she saw him from a distance standing next to Richard.

"_**I was approached by this phoney character at London airport. And I was intrigued enough to do as he said, and what's more, I think that was his plan. He knew I would be." **_There was a sound outside her room, footsteps beyond the door. _**"Someone's coming,"**_ she got out before she closed the window.

Sitting down to play the part of someone in the last minute stages of getting ready, Sharon played with the laces of her shoes whilst keeping her senses attuned to Craig and Richard. She knew they were still nearby, too curious about what was going on. A harsh knock came from the door.

"Come in." Marion walked in, wearing an identical outfit to Sharon's, and a sour expression on her face; Sharon didn't know if it was something she herself had said to make this woman dislike her, but she hoped that Marion was usually like this to everyone knew before becoming friendly.

"We're ready," she said in a clipped tone, staring at Sharon with cold eyes. "Dr Glind doesn't like to be kept waiting."

Sharon stood up and headed out of the room, speaking as she went, "Then we'd better hurry Marion, it wouldn't do for you to be late."

She heard Marion's low huff as the woman closed her door behind them. She knew it was kind of petty and catty, but she didn't really care; she wasn't going to let Marion, even if it was the woman's way of probing friends, get to her.

The two women met up with Glind on their way to the gymnasium, and the silent doctor followed them inside. The other agents were busy doing warm-up exercises. Soon the others noticed the new arrivals, and they stopped what they were doing.

"I hear you're going to join us, Sharon," Paul Lang said, his easy-going smile a stark contrast with Marion's cold demeanour.

Sharon smiled her most charming smile back; she was pleased it was only one agent giving her the cold shoulder and not the others even if Marion's attitude struck her as childish, but she'd feel even better if she knew where this 'experiment' was going. She had some ideas of what it was going to mean, but nothing definitive. One of the things bothering her about this case was she had no idea if these people even knew the real reasons why Glind had set all this up in the first place, and she knew the rooms were bugged; she'd lost count of the number of times she'd felt the closed-circuit tv cameras watching and tracking her. It made her feel as though she were under a microscope.

"I'm going to try," she replied.

"Ah, I'm defeated already," Jean sighed theatrically, leaning on the parallel bars he and Paul had just been exercising on, but Sharon didn't notice as her senses were beginning to tell her someone was about to throw something at her..."Sharon, yours!" Sharon sighed mentally when Marion lobbed a black juggling club at her... And calmly caught it with her right hand. Marion's face became even colder, if that was possible, as she stood up straight.

"Thank you," Sharon smiled, and then Glind spoke, surprising Sharon; she hadn't expected him to begin speaking for some time.

"There'll be plenty of time for that. Now, this first series of tests is to determine coordination and reflexes," Glind's head had been turning around the room before reaching Sharon. "Ms MacCready, at this stage you will operate as one of the team."

With that he turned and walked out, but then he stopped and turned on his side, and pointed. "I'll give you a signal when I wish you all to begin." Still holding the pin in her hands, Sharon looked curiously between Jean and Paul.

"Begin what?" she asked as the others headed over to a table in front of the window. They knew what this particular series of tests were, unsurprisingly since they'd been here longer.

She could see Francis with a baseball mitt in her hand, and the others were grabbing one for themselves.

"Oh, just games," Paul said lightly, taking the pin from her hands, "we have to humour the old boy sometimes."

Following in the same light vein, Jean added, "Don't worry, we'll treat you gently."

"Speak for yourself, Jean," Marion said. Showing she was kinder to the other, more frigid blond, Susan Francis handed Sharon a mitt glove of her own to use for the tests.

"Here, you'll need this," she said, turning to gaze at her friend. "Some of us try to be enthusiastic." Everyone spread out into a circle, some bouncing lightly on her feet to get ready for the game ahead. Sharon felt like she was back at school where everyone was forced to practice throwing balls at each other, but this time they were being watched in a laboratory. After a while of waiting in the silent room, Paul grew impatient. "Come on, doctor," he said. As if in answer to Paul's impatient whine, there was buzzing sound.

"To you Paul," Marion said, even looking in Paul's direction...but Sharon was unsurprised by her dodge and throw the ball in her direction, having seen Marion prepare to lob the baseball at her. Marion stiffened when she saw that Sharon had caught the ball in her mitt, looking calm.

"Just a friendly game, then?" she said, unimpressed and tired by Marion's catty attitude rather than simply take it in stride, as she had after that little fencing duel before Glind interrupted, and when she'd lobbed that juggling pin.

She'd have to do better than this if she was trying to get under Sharon's skin. Much better. The game proceeded from there - it wasn't a really complicated game; everyone just threw the ball at random, but since everyone in the room had a form of ESP on hand, they had general predictions of who would pass the ball onto whom. Not Sharon. She knew precisely where the ball was going to be passed, whether to her, to Paul, to Marion, or to Jean, to Susan. It was boringly simple for her to catch the ball, the tricky part was making it appear that she only had the vaguest guess of where it would come.

It didn't have to look too convincing for Glind and Daniels; she knew they hadn't believed her when she'd told them she didn't know where her powers had come from. They weren't that gullible and they wouldn't have gone to this much trouble to bring her here if they were just going to believe fairy tales like that.

Craig's mind touching her own did nothing to disturb Sharon's concentration, for which she was thankful for; she was having a hard enough time coping with being watched by the cameras as it was. _**"Sharon, we're at the window. What have you found out so far?" **_

"_**Not much." **_

Richard joined the telepathic conversation with a question of his own, _**"What do they know about you?"**_

That was a good question; the fact she was here, in the midst of people her friends were themselves investigating, clearly for the same basic reasons Tremayne had ordered her on leave in the first place, meant these people knew a great deal about her to involve her in something like this. _**"Everything."**_ Her reply followed with the memories of everything that had happened to her up until that point; Tremayne meeting her in his office, telling her to go on leave, all those looks he'd sent her way when he'd thought she wasn't looking, Cranmore and his story, the phoney yet compelling explanation Glind had given her after Daniels had examined her, up until this test. In return the two men of their trio passed on their own memories - the break-in at the research centre, showing the footage they'd seen and memorised of the black-clad operative who'd managed to get past the centre's security...only to lose his intelligence, reverting to a childlike state. Sharon saw the conversation Craig and Richard had had with the doctor in charge of the operative's care before he was killed.

Like them, she was interested in the operative's fear of the encephalograph they'd used to probe his brain to determine the exact cause of his breakdown. Like her two friends, Sharon didn't think his murder was a coincidence, though she couldn't understand why they bothered; how could a man who'd managed to stage such a brilliant break in, being regressed to the level of a child with no mental awareness in the process, be a threat? Or was there something more to it than that? Sharon passed on her thoughts silently to Richard and Craig as the test continued.

"_**Your fellow players seem to be giving you a pretty good account of themselves," **_Richard said, impressed. Sharon mentally rolled her eyes; trust Richard to be impressed. But she knew he'd gathered already this test was going to become boring to her very quickly. Ever the more practical one, Craig said through the ether,_** "Sharon, you stay put. We're gonna check with Tremayne, see what he's up to."**_

"_**When will you be back?" **_Sharon asked before she was distracted by the baseball.

"_**Tonight,"**_ Richard told her before adding, _**"late, I should think." **_The connection between the three of them faded; Sharon was sad about that, it would've been nice to have someone she knew she could trust for the company, but she knew Richard and Craig were right. They all needed to know what Tremayne knew. Actually, she doubted he really knew anything for definite, but still...

In the meantime she was stuck here, in the middle of Britain somewhere, in a manor where a scientist was conducting an experiment she didn't really understand yet, putting them through their paces in these stupid games... Sharon had quickly grown mentally bored with the game - she remembered playing it privately with Richard and Craig after that mess in Tibet; only that time they did it without cameras watching and scrutinising their every move. It hadn't been a difficult game to get around, either. The three of them had started testing and training their minds and bodies to learn how to activate and use their new abilities. But games like this grew boring too quickly no matter if you wore masks to cover your eyes and block all sounds, which is what Sharon had done with her friends. These agents were fast, but they were doing it slowly to give their bodies time to adjust to the pace. Sharon relaxed into it, hoping when Craig and Richard came back, they'd have answers.


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer - I don't own The Champions, just this story.

Feedback, feel free.

A/N - I've added a scene of my own into this chapter to spice things up a bit.

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Sharon's Experiment.

Night had come, and there was still no sign of Craig or Richard; Sharon knew she was being illogical in expecting either of them to touch her mind, let her know she was there since it would take hours for them to get back from Geneva after leaving so soon from Britain. In the meantime, she was just pleased the rest of the day had gone by so smoothly; after lunch, they'd done a host of other tests on the mental angle. This latest test was one of them, the last one of the night, apparently. Sharon, standing next to Marion, who was gowned in a flowing flowery gown with long sleeves which was a contrast to the simple pink dress Sharon herself was wearing, or Susan's green dress. Paul and Jean, likewise, were wearing suits.

All three of them were playing Russian roulette, guessing the number the ball landed on when the wheel stopped spinning. Sharon had never really liked this game, but she had played this particular game before; there were other games that were more rigorous that she and her fellow Nemesis agents had played after Tibet, besides this one was too simple, really. Craig had played it once or twice with Richard, yet she had always refused to play because she had wanted to test her mind

Paul threw in the ball, and Marion closed her eyes for a moment as everyone looked at her, waiting for her to guess the number.

She opened her eyes again, "26."

The roulette wheel spun around for a few more seconds, everyone watching it closely until it stopped - with Paul's help - right on top of the number 26. Sharon glanced at Marion, seeing the look of smug triumph. She had every reason to be smug, of course; this was a game of chance. There were so many variables.

Marion turned to Sharon, eyes twinkling. "Why don't you try?"

Surprised by Marion's generosity after all the cold attitude, Sharon smiled, "Roulette never was my game."

That was true enough. There were dozens of games of chance, some far more interesting and challenging compared to roulette, and Sharon had played dozens of them over the years since she'd gained her powers. It was always a good idea to exercise the mind, and to push the boundaries to see what kind of things they could do with the powers that the people who'd saved them from that plane crash had given them.

"Oh, you really ought to try," Jean's accented voice said next to her, "we find it very good practice."

Sharon remained silent. One of the reasons she'd only done a few rounds of guesses was because she was too focused on the meeting her friends were having with Tremayne. She wanted to have a little word with him herself; he might be an experienced and exceptional spymaster who genuinely cared for his agents, but it didn't give him the right to make decisions for her without bothering to explain the risks.

There was sheer awe in Marion's voice. "The odds of against 3 direct calls in a row are quite fantastic."

"Not in Monte Carlo," Sharon told her, "it happens all the time."

The expression on Marion's face changed from happy and awestruck to the cold, emotionless one she'd worn earlier. Sharon sighed mentally when she realised what she'd done; she hadn't come here to make friends, but it was necessary for these people to be as welcoming towards her as possible. She knew that with Craig and Richard on their way, she only had a narrow window to learn as much as she could from everyone here, and alienating them wasn't going to help, even if it were unintentional. But Marion seemed too sensitive to be an agent. Sharon just couldn't win where she was concerned, but she did hope that they'd get through to each other eventually. She hated walking on eggshells around people, especially those in the same profession as herself.

"Your attention, please," Glind's said from behind them, and they all turned to see the doctor walk into the room, the same smug, self-assured expression fixed solidly on his face. "You have been playing now for exactly 30 minutes."

"Why exactly, doctor?" Sharon asked curiously.

"Why?" The surprised expression on Glind's face was almost comical, but Sharon didn't laugh herself as she asked, "Well, why are you so specific about time?" Sharon knew scientific experiments sometimes had a time limit or a time factor, but truthfully anything could happen and at any time. For instance, in this case, it could take months or even years to make a human being develop some form of ESP. It wasn't something you could conjure up. Glind and his ilk seemed to believe it came through a timetable. His reply didn't reassure her, either.

"When dealing in microseconds, Ms Macready, one has to be specific," Glind replied, leaving Sharon to her thoughts. Glind's explanation did make sense, but she still thought he was being inflexible. She paid attention to Glind's next words. "It is time that you rested," he said before turning back to Sharon, she had the feeling he was telling her this specifically as though she were a retarded child that needed reminding of the facts. "You will be on call again, from 7.30 am."

Sharon smiled despite her annoyance she wasn't getting anywhere with the case. "Exactly, well goodnight." With the others she walked out of the room, heading for their quarters. "You seem to challenge him every time," Paul Lang commented.

Grateful for a chance to speak to someone without having a mental or physical game to work through, Sharon looked at the British agent closely. "I just think it's odd," she said with her usual casual tone, though she was anything but casual at the moment. She knew she was being watched, but hopefully what she had to say to Lang wouldn't be that surprising to someone new to the lodge.

"What?" Lang asked her, looking down at her curiously. Inwardly Sharon smiled, pleased that her trick to gain information had been seemingly lost on Lang. "That Glind's so interested in creating super-beings, yet he's putting it all down to a timetable. He's not accounting for the variables; other people's minds are different, meaning they react differently to stress. Those games he has us go through, all those physical exercises, anyone can really do them. It just takes time and practice."

Lang looked at her with interest before he nodded in agreement.

Sharon hadn't expected that; she was ashamed to admit that the other agents had grown so complacently used to everything going on around them, that they'd stopped questioning things. "Your right," Lang whispered, clearly as aware as she about them watching them. "They do rush us through the tests, and they won't let us call home, write letters. Glind's probably worried we'd use a code or something," he laughed under his breath, "he's probably right as well. We don't really trust him, but we have to admit he's good at what he does. Without him, we'd have never have pushed the boundaries; when we first came here, we had only the most basic knowhow of how to use our talents."

Paul glanced around him and smiled at her genially. "Well, this is my room. See you in the morning." With that he turned and headed inside, closing his door with a gentle snap.

Sharon was more than a little disappointed she hadn't gotten anything else from Paul, but she supposed it made sense; judging from the way everyone acted, she wasn't sure if they'd come willingly or against their own wills. She imagined it was the former than the latter. They'd probably been invited here rather than being kidnapped (Cranmore and the others could dress it up how much they wanted, but she was kidnapped), and Sharon had no interest in telling them until after this mess was dealt with.

Getting out of bed still fully dressed, like she'd planned to get some proper answers to her questions before Richard and Craig returned, Sharon crept out of her bedroom and into the corridor outside after carefully keeping an ear out for any movement. She'd decided to check the sickbay out before trying the laboratory she knew was the brain of the operation Glind was running. But she wanted to check the medical information to see if there was anything there. Walking silently down the stairs, she paused when she heard someone coming, and she darted out of sight.

Peeping around the corner, she saw Cranmore carrying a gun, on patrol. Fortunately, he only did a cursory sweep of the hall before he went through another door. Sharon came out of hiding and listened carefully in case he was coming back, but she couldn't hear any footsteps. Sharon turned and hurried off; she didn't know if the guards from outside were the only ones, or if Cranmore was alone, but she wasn't going to take any chances. She had to find that information before Craig and Richard arrived. Instinctively, and from years of experience, she knew they were on their way. She crept into the sickbay and went over to the desk. She rifled through the papers, but she didn't see anything interesting. It was just medical notes on the five people in the lodge that were being observed like rats in a maze. Aside from that, there wasn't anything elaborate. After cautiously looking around, she tested the drawer but found it locked. Unsurprised and not bothered, she applied her strength to pull the drawer out of its lock.

There wasn't anything special in the drawer, so she left the room and hurried to the laboratory. She didn't have any thoughts about knocking Cranmore out with a quick karate chop, he was just in the way, and she hurried up the stairs.

After walking around the upper level, she focused on her hearing and caught the sound of computers behind a wooden door painted olive green. Padding over to the door, Sharon carefully listened, but she couldn't hear any sounds apart from the computers, so considering it a safe room for her investigation she opened the door...

And to her surprise, she found Dr Glind and another man, slightly younger than Glind in a white lab coat, standing in front of a console next to a bank of computers looking at her. Sharon realised too late she had been tricked, they had been monitoring her, knowing she would sneak about.

"Come in, Ms Macready," Glind's said in his typical smug manner. There was a flash of movement to Sharon's left, and she jolted back when she saw Daniels, a white surgical mask covering her nose and mouth, holding a gas cylinder, but it was too late for her to do anything about it. A white gas was expelled from the nozzle, and Sharon's vision became drowsy...


	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer - I don't own The Champions, just this story.

Feel free to leave feedback.

* * *

Sharon's Experiment.

Once, just once, she would like to be unexpected by her enemies on a case. As Sharon started to regain consciousness, she wondered how she and the others got into these messes. It was bad enough they were in the business of being shot at, threatened, or near drowned, but when they were gassed it reminded them they could still make mistakes, she just wished those mistakes couldn't get them nearly killed. Somehow Sharon was humbled by that part of the powers given to them, it meant they were still human. Too bad it sometimes had its downsides.

The gas Daniels had spurted at her had knocked her out, but she wasn't sure how much time had passed. She didn't really care much either, she was too busy hoping to get out. Sharon knew the sudden knockout she'd experienced had been telepathically transmitted to Craig and Richard, and it would make them come here faster. She hoped it didn't make them careless; she'd made enough mistakes already without them adding to the pantheon. She'd guessed Glind and Daniels were awake the whole time; they'd been pulling the string for too long to suddenly give in to the urge to sleep, but she hadn't expected this. When she woke up and noticed the chair she was in, she quickly saw the restraints tying her down to the armrests. They were quite strong, however, she knew with some time she could get through them.

Glind was standing next to her, and out of the corner of her eye, she saw Daniels standing a little further behind her leader. The other man was sitting in front of a machine feeding him a steady stream of paper. "Yes, my dear," Glind's smugness oozed from every pore of his body, never mind his voice, "we're no longer concerned with keeping up appearances."

"I'm glad." The relief in Sharon's voice was genuine. "I was beginning to find your charade rather boring."

Glind didn't seem disappointed or particularly bothered that she'd found the play boring. He leaned closer. "These powers of yours, how did you get them?" he asked.

Sharon almost laughed in his face; after telling him before she didn't know, knowing he and the others didn't believe her, and gassing her, he still expected her to tell him that?

It wouldn't do any good if he did know. Even if she told him about the Tibetans and what they'd done, what they'd learnt after realising they were different after that crash, he couldn't just travel there to find them. Richard had found the old man just by chance, but they believed he was waiting in the open for them to come to him, which made sense of why Richard found him after only an hour of looking around.

He wouldn't know where to start, the mountains were too numerous and the terrain treacherous. Besides, he probably wouldn't believe her. Ordinary people were happy to believe in something as obscure or ridiculous as lost cities or civilisations, but hearing the truth about them was something else.

She momentarily wondered how he would have reacted had she told him about the Tibetan civilisation, and she instantly dismissed it. No, she wasn't going to say a word.

"I told you, I don't know," she said at last.

Glind didn't say anything, he just caught the eye of the other man, who shook his head and shrugged. Sharon now recognised the device as a lie detector, and she had to swallow the urge to laugh again. These people were so pathetic it was funny; they were relying too much on technology to tell if she was lying, yet their instincts probably told them she was lying.

"Haven't you any faith in your own equipment, doctor?" she asked.

"No matter. My interest was purely academic," Glind replied evenly, surprising Sharon again. He didn't even seem disappointed or upset she refused to tell him the truth, in fact, he didn't even seem to care despite how often he tried to question her.

"You can't tell me you went to all this trouble for academic reasons," she said, looking around the room, taking in the console, the lie detector, the computers...but she took into account the security here, men with guns run and organised by Cranmore, the meeting she'd had with the man in the taxi which was obviously arranged, that break-in at the research centre, Craig and Richard's involvement, and those other agents here who were duped by Glind. The amount of trouble the scientist had gone to was amazing enough as it was, but that didn't mean she didn't completely understand.

Not yet. What was the point? What was missing from the puzzle?

Glind's smug voice became even more smug. "The reasons for our little experiment are, I imagine, on their way here," he said. "They will come to find you." Sharon knew who he was talking about, but she wasn't going to let him see he'd gotten to her.

What did Craig and Richard have to do with all this?

"They?" Sharon asked innocently, hoping to buy time. Glind's eyes crinkled as he looked at her with something like disappointment. "Surely you didn't think we believed you were the only Nemesis agent with extra talents? We know all about Craig Stirling and Richard Barrett."

"You'll learn nothing from them," Sharon protested, seeing no point in hiding the fact that not only were the three of them together but knew about their own abilities. To her surprise Glind didn't seem concerned or bothered by the notion he wouldn't get another two guinea pigs to study, not that he'd be able to; both of them had probably seen her be gassed, so the chances of them cooperating with Glind were nil.

"Learn?" Glind echoed derisively as though Sharon had told him something ridiculous. Sharon was surprised, she'd thought the whole point of her being here was to study how her powers worked and to develop the mind from there, surely he'd be over the moon if he'd learnt Nemesis had two other agents like her? He smiled down at her, it came off more as a leer. "My dear Ms. Macready, we already have all the information we require. Every test you took, every move you made, even the way you pretended to believe our little subterfuge." Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Glind gesture towards the bank of computers. "All here. All catalogued, analysed and filed, in these computers."

He leaned closer to her, but Sharon almost didn't hear him as her mind was spinning at more pieces of the puzzle fitted together. She'd known they were watching her, known that she and Nemesis would notice eventually what was happening. That business with the research centre had probably been the tipping point, or maybe not, for Tremayne's decision to send her on leave.

Privately Sharon knew Tremayne had sent her out as bait, probably connecting the break-in with the stalkers. But the amount of trouble Glind had gone through... All to get to her, Craig and Richard? Another thing that bothered her the most with the revelations Glind was shoving into her face were the facts of the tests, everything she'd done with the others had been analysed and filed by the computers. It shouldn't have bothered her, logically the same thing would've happened with Marion, Paul and the others.

It was how Glind had emphasised it that worried her like he was preparing something for her friends.

"But if you knew that I didn't believe...," Sharon stopped that train of thought, realising the truth.

"Go on, my dear. Work it out," Glind said, sounding very much like a schoolteacher asking a particularly dim student to work out a sum.

"Then you knew Nemesis was investigating you," Sharon breathed, looking at Glind in disbelief. It all made sense; true, they probably wouldn't have realised it WAS Glind personally who was behind the research centre break-in at first, but that was academic. All that Richard and Craig would need would be a trail of breadcrumbs, a trail left there by Glind and his accomplices - Richard and Craig had passed on enough information to her when they'd arrived at the lodge earlier that Cranmore himself had killed the man in that hospital...and all that time she would be here, at the lodge, and sooner or later her friends would get the right lead, and find her.

But what did Glind get from it?

"More than that," Glind corrected, warming to his theme and she knew she would have her answer in a second, "we intended that we should," he said, though as the jigsaw pieces slotted nicely together, the revelation didn't do much to surprise Sharon. Why do you think I arranged that little, eh, business at the research centre?"

"Then the whole thing is an elaborate trick?" Sharon asked, not saying anything about the research centre. Glind might have guessed she knew about the break-in before she had been sent on 'leave,' but she didn't know and didn't care.

"And the art of the good conjurer is to keep the attention of his victim occupied." Glind's egotistic attitude made Sharon want to rip the restraints holding her down so she could lunge for his throat so she wouldn't have to hear it again, but she held herself back since the longer he spoke, the more pieces of the puzzle fell into place.

"The only thing your people have is speed," Sharon couldn't help but point out, deciding to give the good doctor a piece of carrot.

Glind took the bait. "Superhuman speed," Glind was quick to correct her, his smug manner hadn't dissipated and it was grating on her nerves, "with strength and IQ to match. Almost unique." The emphasis on the last two words wasn't lost on her.

"Almost unique, so that's it?" Sharon repeated, looking Glind right in the face as the full horror of what was happening entered her mind.

"Yes, my dear," Glind answered mockingly like a teacher pleased his retarded student had finally caught on, "that is indeed it," and then his whole attitude changed from smugly superior about how well his plan had proceeded to manically hysterical.

"The only people who could stand up, who could jeopardise whatever I wanted to do in the future, who could endanger my creations are Craig Stirling, Richard Barrett, and Sharon Macready."

"And the experiment?" Sharon asked, though now she had all the basics of the puzzle together, she could pretty much guess what Glind had in mind for her and her friends; she wasn't naive enough to believe he was going to just let her go, especially if he planned to kill Craig and Richard who were Nemesis agents, and if they'd gone back to Tremayne, then the head of Nemesis' operations would know precisely where they'd gone missing, and would start a witchhunt for Glind.

She knew both her friends well, they would have told Tremayne who they were dealing with, and unless Glind really was that complacent and inflexible, he wouldn't get far. But Sharon still wanted to know one more thing.

Now that she'd gotten Glind to peel off the dead skin to reveal the rot beneath, she didn't for one moment believe that he was conducting a major experiment for the sake of it; anyone could gather smart security agents from all around the world to develop ESP by forcing them into situations that would tax anyone, and Sharon hadn't seen anything that resembled anything complex or unique enough for Glind to be this smug, the encephalograph boosting the brain didn't really count since it was well known it could be dangerous in the wrong hands.

Too bad Glind had the wrong hands. But what really disgusted her, besides the way these people disregarded the lives of those they used, was how they saw herself, Craig and Richard,, but truthfully when Glind's words replayed themselves, she wondered what he meant by what he wanted to do in the future, it left a lot of open territories.

"To give all the facts to the computer," Glind said and wheeled her around to face a squat green computer and walked towards it and rested his left hand on top of it, "and from those facts, let it devise a way, a perfect way," he added and jabbed a finger in her direction for emphasis, "of killing you all."

Sharon watched coldly and angrily as the scientist pressed a few controls and waited for a long sheet of paper to roll out, it was covered by complex diagrams. Glind tore the sheet off and studied it for a second before turning it over and holding it in both hands. "This way," he said triumphantly.

Sharon just glared at him.

"They're in the grounds now?" Glind asked the white-coated man from his position behind Sharon; whatever he was doing behind her, Sharon didn't know and frankly didn't care. All that mattered to her at the moment was escaping and foiling Glind's plan. Cranmore had regained consciousness after a good few hours, and he didn't look worse for wear.

She ignored his presence; he might be armed, but he wasn't really a problem for her. The white-coated man glanced over his shoulder from his monitors. "Over by the West wall," the man replied.

"Good. You'd better start the final process," Glind said, presumably to Daniels who was still in the room. But the female scientist didn't leave at once. "What about these figures?" Daniels asked in that quiet grating way of hers, "If I use this much power, our people will burn out in a quarter of an hour." Sharon licked her lips, knowing what Daniels was saying.

The encephalograph. Glind hadn't shown her too much of the plan his computers had come up with to kill Craig and Richard and herself, but she knew there was no way any of the agents in the house would do it without outside influence; Glind wasn't their boss, he had invited them here to partake in a scientific experiment, not murder. They wouldn't kill two people, not without reason, but if they were controlled somehow…..

Glind had found a way to boost their speed and strength by using the encephalograph, just like that man Richard and Craig had met at that hospital before his death. The fact Glind and Daniels, both doctors and scientists, were willing to do this was enough to make Sharon sick. Glind's reply only made her realise how far he was willing to go, and his complete apathy for life upset her.

"They need only 5 minutes to accomplish their task," he said.

"It's a good team," Daniels chided - Sharon didn't know if the woman genuinely cared or if she was just bothered about the time it took to train other people.

"We can train others."

Daniels tried once more to make Glind see that all this effort wasn't needed, but Sharon knew he would ignore it, place all his faith in his precious computer's plans.

"We wouldn't need this much speed if we gave them guns," she said.

Sharon rolled her eyes, this woman had the same subtlety as a bulldozer.

"The computer chose the weapons, and the method," Glind argued back, "it's too late to change it now."

Sharon heard Daniels heeled shoes head to the door and leave the room, closing the door behind her. Over her shoulder, she wasn't surprised when Glind walked over to Cranmore, who'd spent the last few minutes standing close to Sharon and holding a gun.

"Go with her," he ordered briskly, clearly referring to Daniels, "make sure she follows instructions."

Cranmore nodded, handed over his gun to Glind, and walked out of the room, leaving Sharon alone with Glind and the other scientist who hadn't said a word to her in all the time she'd been here. She wasn't really surprised by Glind's lack of faith in Daniels keeping to her orders, or Daniels trying to force a quicker and cruder solution; she was that type of person.

How she became a scientist, Sharon didn't really know.

"Are you sure they'll obey your orders, doctor?" Sharon asked.

"They can do nothing else, Ms Macready," Glind said, believing that she was referring to the agents whose brains were about to be emptied of what made them who they were, clearly not realising her question also referred to Daniels and Cranmore themselves, who probably preferred the less scientific route than Glind. Sharon had already gotten the impression Daniels didn't really care about science all that much; true, she hadn't spent much time with her to get a true feel for the other woman's sorry excuse for a personality, but Sharon felt the woman would've been happier hearing people scream in agony.

Glind's methods weren't her preference.

Cranmore wasn't a scientist and probably didn't give a thought about his employers' methods, but compared to Daniels, Cranmore was more levelheaded. Glind went on, "Whatever, whoever, they were, they are now completely under my control."

The smug way he said that had Sharon turn to him in disgust; she'd wanted to know if Glind had any faith in his cronies to get the job done. It was clear he didn't trust them that much. "And do they know that fifteen minutes later they'll be mindless?" she asked in disgust.

"No. But you won't even be that Ms Macready," Glind replied smugly and then he went and sat down at the console next to the other man.

Sharon thought quietly for a second, trying to think of a way of getting through to Glind before it was too late. Only one thing sprang to mind, it was a long shot though, but it would be a good way to buy some time. She flexed the muscles in her wrists, testing the strength of the restraints again. They'd been unbelievably tight when she'd woken up, and they'd needed a bit of flexing just to allow her the room she needed to snap them. Now they were ready.

Good.

"I know a lot more than you think, doctor," she began conversationally, turning her head so she could look at Glind. He wasn't looking at her, not that it mattered. "I know you've adapted the encephalograph to boost the electrical energy in the brain, and I also know it doesn't last, that your computers have miscalculated badly."

"Nonsense," Glind replied, staring at her coldly for her attack on his precious computers. Sharon would've laughed if the situation wasn't so serious. This man considered himself a scientist, and yet he was so dependent on a bank of adding machines to do his thinking for him! She narrowed her eyes at him though he didn't see it.

"It's calculations were based upon my reflexes, plus speed and the element of surprise." Her voice became even more sly and calculating as she put forward a hypothetical scenario for Glind to consider, hypothetical for him but factual for her. "Suppose your computers haven't had all the necessary information? What if I do know how I got my powers?" She smirked inwardly when Glind stopped what he was doing at the console, and turned to face her with an expression she couldn't decipher. Glad she had his attention she carried on.

"And what if those same powers have enabled me to fool your machines?" Her voice lowered a fraction to drive it into Glind's head. "Suppose Barrett and Stirling are not surprised?"

Glind continued to stare at her, she could now see it was disbelief or even worry for what would happen if she was right and he was wrong. She didn't understand his reaction - Sharon was sure Glind had realised she was lying about her powers, or else she wouldn't have been pressed by him, but why had he taken the risk she didn't know and inputted it into the computer? Part of Sharon hoped Glind would call this off, see sense before Daniels finished what she was doing; she didn't even know how many of the agents the other scientist had gotten through already, but she just hoped it wasn't all of them.

The white-coated man spoke, breaking through Glind's thoughts much to Sharon's annoyance. She'd hoped she was getting through to him to stop all this. "I'm getting interference from the main hall," the white-coated man said.

Forgetting what Sharon had just said to him, Glind ordered, "Contact Daniels."

Sharon turned out of the whole thing for a minute, though she was aware of the lab-coated man speaking to Daniels through an intercom, and her telling him she was ready. That meant she'd processed every agent in a short amount of time. Sharon wondered how she'd persuaded them to undergo the procedure because she decided it made little difference now. Every agent who would soon lose their minds in a quarter of an hour. Carefully Sharon moved her wrist around, using her strength to wear down the restraint; they'd certainly decided to take no chances with her, but that wasn't a surprise. But they'd made the mistake of thinking that her strength had limits. Granted, it would take time for her to snap the restraint holding down her left wrist, but it was better than watching Glind and his white-coated assistant leaning over a monitor like spectators at a boxing game. She watched as Cranmore walked in with Daniels.

"How is it?"

Glind's face was alight with excitement. "Perfect. Every move is perfect," he gushed in awe. Sharon kept one eye on the screen as she saw her friends take on the charged agents, but she didn't really pay it much attention as her mind was working on the details of the rushed plan she was trying to come up with.

She was aware when someone - it looked like Lang - charge Craig, who caught him in an armlock...just as Marion threw a knife. Craig used Paul as a human shield, and surprised Marion, though that had more to do with the fact what Craig had just done went against the program Glind had put them through. The agents were like computers, Sharon realised, programmed for a specific task without any kind of variable or contingency in case something like this happened.

By that point, Sharon had managed to snap the belt around her wrist and used her free hand to untie the other. It had taken longer than she'd expected to snap the tie, and she didn't have any more time to try it on the other. In the meantime Glind didn't seem to like the direction this fight was going, Sharon didn't blame him, but he was more concerned about the time factor than anything else.

"It's taking too long," he shook his head, the expression on his face as much as Sharon could see was perplexed. She knew he'd hoped, expected, this fight to be much shorter, and from the slight whirr of the computers, she guessed they were recording the fight for analysis to make the next generation of superhumans he was planning to create when this batch died even stronger. She hated to admit it, but this was a good way of testing her far his creations could go, but it was disgusting the way he was callous towards them and their mental health.

Glind's overconfidence and apathy over what was going to happen any moment made him repulsive. "Paul's dead," Cranmore pointed out, sounding as unconcerned about the knowledge someone he'd known was dead as Glind probably was, sliding his gun from under his jacket. "I might be able to even things up?" he suggested evenly.

Glind was silent at that, and Sharon didn't need to see his face to know he didn't like what was happening on the screen, and he liked Cranmore's suggestion even less. Sharon wondered what he would decide to do, and when he did respond she wasn't that surprised, knowing that he was desperate.

"Alright," he replied, "but keep out of their way." Cranmore left the room to carry out his self-appointed mission, the others not bothering to see him leave the room, all their attention was focused on the screen.

Sharon tried not to look at it in case it would be the last time she saw either Craig or Richard alive, but she couldn't help it; she winced when she saw Jean stab Richard in the arm, the Frenchman would've killed Richard if Craig hadn't attacked him and pulled him away and into another room nearby. Glind and Daniels crowded around the screen, making it hard for Sharon to see it clearly even as she braced herself, but she could see Marion, Jean, and Susan crowded outside the door to the room Craig and Richard had gone in to escape. And to assess their wounds.

The two men might be higher than the three brainwashed agents, but Sharon knew the energy boost they'd gotten from sealing themselves off gave them an edge.

"Now, don't wait!" Glind hissed as they started smashing the door to get to their victims.

That was it, Sharon leapt from her chair before Glind or Daniels could react, and shoved the white-coated man to the ground. Glind took out the gun Cranmore had handed to him earlier and levelled it at her chest. "One move," he warned quietly, his voice low with anger at her interference. "The slightest move..."

"You can't win, Doctor," Sharon said.

"Can't I?" Glind's smug demeanour had returned in full as he smirked at her. "One wounded, the other exhausted. It's too easy."

Sharon reached behind her for the microphone controls, she had scanned the console when she'd made her break away from the chair, so she knew where the controls were, and she had placed her fingers as close to the mike controls as possible. "There isn't time. You know your team is due to collapse any minute," Sharon wondered how long it would take for Glind and Daniels to realise she was so close to the microphone controls.

"Five minutes is time enough," Glind said, unaware for the moment the microphone was now open.

Sharon sneered at the scientist with disdain, "If they knew you'd destroyed their minds, they'd be hunting you, Doctor Glind."

"But they don't," Glind replied complacently, "and by the time they find out, it would be too late."

Sharon said nothing for a second since she'd gotten what she'd wanted; Glind's confession, unintentional as it was since he had no idea she'd relayed it to the surviving agents, but then she'd dropped the coup de grace. "You'll condemn them all to a living death."

She knew she was taking a chance, but she was sure the survival instincts of the agents would break through enough of the brainwashing to make them change their focus from killing Craig and Richard and herself towards Daniels, Glind, and the others before their brains burnt out completely. It was a long shot, it might not work, but she hoped for Craig and Richard's sake it did... Glind still hadn't noticed the microphone had been switched on. "They're all volunteers, just the same as you," he said, unaware that his words could be the final nail in his coffin.

Letting herself be held prisoner was harder than Sharon had expected, but she didn't want to be in that chair again. She didn't move or say a word as the white-coated man sat back down at the console. As he did Daniels noticed something that made her cry with alarm, and made Sharon smile smugly herself. "Doctor, the microphone's open," she cried in panic.

The fear that materialised on Glind's face and was already present on Daniel's leathery features told Sharon her thoughts on whether her little play wouldn't succeed were flawed. After a brief stare of panic, Daniels rushed to the door and threw it open - what she hoped to accomplish when she was clearly implicated as well, Sharon didn't know, but she imagined the sour woman was planning to escape - and jerked back with a grunt, and she collapsed to the ground with a knife in the breast.

Sharon stood still as two figures - Jean and Marion - walked slowly into the room. Sharon couldn't see Susan Francis anywhere, though she knew she'd been with her friends when Glind's confession had been relayed through the lodge. Her heart ached at the implications of what had happened to her, though there was nothing she nor anyone else could do to help her.

"I was lying to her, giving you time," Glind tried to bluster, but neither brainwashed agent showed any hint of believing him; Sharon had no idea what he expected. He'd had them brainwashed in a process that would leave them as vegetables, and he'd just admitted they were expendable to them. Was he really that stupid? Glind proved he was truly stupid when it came to his own self-preservation when he jabbed the gun in their direction - it wouldn't do him any good, they were too fast and, truthfully, what did they have to lose when their brains were burning out already?

"Get back, go on get back!" This was too much for the white-coated technician, and he got up and tried to make a dash for it. He tried to get past Marion, forgetting she saw him and Glind as the reason for their present mess, and she chopped him twice with the final blow to the neck killing him. Seeing his only living ally cut down literally made Glind panic as he shot blindly, and caught Jean in the shoulder as the agent lunged for his throat. As much as she wanted to see him pay for what he'd done, Sharon wanted Glind to live so he could be put into prison.

She tried to pull the angry brainwashed man off Glind even as Jean methodically used the last he had to choke Glind to death. The scientist spluttered as Jean bared down on him to stop any attempt to try and break free. The feeling of hands firmly ripping her away Jean made Sharon look into the eyes of Marion; she could almost see a glimmer of the former woman before the brainwashing, and that made her stop. Glind spluttered and gurgled as Jean finished strangling him. The scientists' death seemed to be the trigger for the collapse of the agents. Jean staggered around looking before he slid to the ground, taking out the knife he had in his belt and just idly played with it, and Marion let go of Sharon, like a puppet who'd had her strings snipped. Except this puppet was a living human being, Sharon thought sadly when Marion slowly sank to the ground, her mouth opened and her eyes sightless. She turned when she saw Craig and Richard come in, Richard still sporting that injury he'd received when he'd been stabbed, just gazing at the sight in front of them. "It's all over, Craig," Sharon said once she'd made her way over to them. Craig nodded and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. "Yeah," he said quietly, "it's all over."

But as they walked out of the mansion, Sharon wondered if it was still over. There were other people like Glind, Cranmore, and Daniels all over the world studying telepathy and superhuman potential, but after what happened tonight, she and her colleagues would be ready for them.

* * *

What do you think?


End file.
